Hard-up obesity clinics forced to reject patients

Some health service obesity centres have closed their lists to new patients because they have run out of money.

A doctor in Portsmouth said he had an unofficial waiting list of five years.

The Queen's Medical Centre, Nottingham, will take patients with only serious complications such as diabetes or heart disease. It has been using research money that has run out.

In Cambridgeshire, the centre at Addenbrooke's Hospital has also been using research money. Dr Nick Finer, a consultant at the clinic, said yesterday: "There is no doubt that obesity is perceived as being less important and less worthy of treatment.

"I hoped that reports from eminent bodies such as the World Health Organisation and the Commons select committee would have changed those prejudices but I am not sure they have."

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Doctors say that not treating obesity will be more costly for the health service in the long run.

Besides "prescriptions" for exercise and advice on diets, doctors can give drugs to help people lose weight, combined with changes in their way of life. A few patients have surgery to reduce the size of their stomachs, which makes them feel full when they have eaten only a small meal.

Last month the select committee criticised the Government, the NHS and the food industry for doing too little to fight the epidemic of obesity.

Melanie Johnson, the minister for public health, said it was up to primary care trusts to make sure that enough money was available.

Paul Burstow, the Liberal Democrats' health spokesman, said the problems with the centres showed that the Government was not serious about tackling obesity.

"The complacency of health ministers wholly undermines their approach to the crisis."

• Obese children could suffer life-threatening illness in the future because fat was poisoning their livers, scientists at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, said yesterday.

Their research shows that, in about 10 per cent of cases, a fatty liver can cause inflammation and scarring that can progress to a potentially life-threatening condition called non-alcoholic steatohepatitis.

Dr Ariel Feldstein, a paediatric gastroenterologist at the clinic, said: "Every week I have several patients whose mean age is about 12 that come with symptoms of liver disease. That is very young for this to be happening."